


Among the Lotus

by Lil_Lupin



Category: Alex Rider - Anthony Horowitz
Genre: AR Febuwhump (Alex Rider), Angst, Gen, Mild Injury, Plot Twists
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-14 22:15:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29674071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lil_Lupin/pseuds/Lil_Lupin
Summary: Somehow, Alex keeps forgetting how murky the world of espionage is. Yassen Gregorovich is a sharp reminder.ORAlex gets accosted by a blond stranger on the edge of a cliff in South Asia and has trouble accounting for what happens next.
Relationships: Yassen Gregorovich & Alex Rider
Comments: 18
Kudos: 73
Collections: AR Febuwhump 2021





	Among the Lotus

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to both [Valaks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valaks/pseuds/Valaks) and [Ireliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ireliss/pseuds/Ireliss) for the helpful thoughts and comments on this fic, including on its title and summary. You guys are the best.

Alex Rider’s first impressions of Yassen Gregorovich aren’t promising. 

They consist of eyes that are cold and sharp like the tip of an icicle; a lithe, trim figure that looks uncomfortably as though it might beat Alex in a fight; and the barrel of a Baretta, pointing unerringly at Alex’s forehead. 

Alex doesn’t even have a weapon in his hands. His own gun - a SIG Sauer - is tucked away in its holster, because Alex needed both hands free to make his escape. Which he was about to succeed in when this unknown interloper happened upon him.

An interloper: that is the only term Alex can use at the moment, because although the man seems like he might be inclined to shoot him, he’s not one of the enemy - at least, not one Alex recognises. He, Alex, has spent three weeks inside this godforsaken facility: every night spent creeping around the hallways; every daylight hour carefully cataloguing everyone in the building. Not once has he seen this face - a handsome face, with blond hair and long eyelashes and high cheekbones. It’s a Russian face, he decides, and then wonders why he thinks that. 

“Who’re you?” he demands. 

One fair eyebrow arches upwards. Used to asking the questions, Alex deduces - not answering them.

“Who are _you?”_

“Alex Hill,” he says; his cover identity. 

The man frowns, but he looks puzzled more than anything else. “Government intelligence, presumably,” he says. 

It’s more than a guess. Alex isn’t going to answer it anyway; the stranger can take what he wants to from the silence. “You?” It’s bold to keep pressing for information when he’s not the one holding a weapon; best advice would usually be to keep one’s mouth shut. It’s not a lesson that’s ever come easily to him. Anyway, there’s something about this man that makes Alex want to prove he’s got a backbone. Something - instinct, he thinks, for lack of anything more concrete - tells him it might just save his life.

A pause. “Let’s assume I’m freelance.” 

“Right,” Alex says, though in fact this tells him nothing. A bit braver than he feels, he tries: “So we’re not enemies, then.”

“No,” the man says after a moment, although the nonsensical nature of the English language makes it impossible to tell whether he’s agreeing with Alex or arguing with him. He doesn’t lower the gun, but he doesn’t shoot either. His gaze is travelling minutely across Alex’s face, from left to right and back again. Alex fights the urge to shift his weight under the scrutiny. It feels oddly as though he is being appraised in some way.

“So what’s the plan?” he asks after another minute, and it comes out casually, like they’re old friends trying to decide whether to go to the pub or stay in and watch a film. 

The man’s head drops a fraction to the right as he considers. “Well,” he says, “I would say that, on balance, the guard you left unconscious in the office has already been discovered. They will have checked the CCTV and found it disabled. Your disappearance will have been registered. So,” there is a half lift of his shoulders to indicate inevitability, “it is only a matter of time before they find you here.”

Yes. Which is precisely the reason Alex was trying to escape. He can already hear the barking; they have released the dogs to look for him. If they find him, he’ll be cornered; he is standing at the edge of a cliff with a three hundred foot drop beyond it.

“Well, I’d best be off in that case,” he says with a falsely cheery note to his voice. He’s still standing with the climbing rope in his hands, wrapped around his waist and under his groin and secured around the nearby tree. A few steps backwards and he could be on his way.

“I don’t think so,” the man says. He is calm - in fact nothing has perceptably changed about his tone or his expression, but for the first time Alex feels a sense of creeping unease. It’s perverse that he should only feel this way now, when the man’s been pointing a gun at his forehead for several minutes, and he realises that, for some reason, he’s been expecting the man to let him go. 

“What do you want?” he asks warily.

“Your name, first of all.”

“I told you. It’s Alex Hill.”

“No.” Quiet, but utterly certain. Another statement that doesn’t feel like a guess. 

Alex hesitates, wondering if it’s worse to press on with the lie.

“Your real name,” the man prompts.

Alex weighs his options, conscious that the barking seems to be getting louder. He can’t have long. Option one: he continues to insist he’s called Alex Hill. Possibly stupid when the man already seems to know he’s lying. Option two: step backwards. No chance of abseiling properly - too slow; it would have to be almost a free fall, the rope in his right hand the friction that would save him from certain death. But he knows even at top speed it’ll take him maybe ten seconds to hit the ground. That’s a long time to be an open target for someone standing at the top with a gun in his hand. Option three…

“Rider,” he says, jerking his chin. “Alex Rider.”

Something flickers in the man’s face. Not quite recognition. Disconcertion, perhaps. 

“You look young to be a spy.”

“I’m nineteen,” Alex defends. He wonders why that came out so easily. Something about this man seems to have lured him into a false sense of security; he doesn’t like it. “Who are you?” he asks again. 

From the compound, an alarm starts to sound. The man seems totally unfazed.

“You’ve abseiled before?” he asks, jerking the gun down to the rope around Alex’s torso.

“Yes.” Does he think Alex is suicidal?

“With an emergency line?”

Alex assumes he means with only a rope - not a safety harness or a proper friction line. “Yes.” Once - with the SAS, three years ago. It was terrifying enough then, when he had teammates checking he wasn’t about to kill himself and it was a much shorter drop. Frankly, he’s trying hard not to think about it.

The man inspects the rope with interest. If it were anyone else, it would be a momentary distraction Alex might take advantage of, but the Beretta is still pointed at him, and there’s a smooth and deadly air about the stranger that makes Alex sure that even a fraction of movement will cause him to strike. He tests the length around the tree a little, pulling some of the rope through Alex’s right hand. Then he turns his attention back to Alex, his eyes flitting across his torso. Without warning he ducks under the length of rope extending from the tree to Alex, and he’s suddenly in Alex’s space, strong, graceful fingers sliding along and under the coils around Alex’s chest. Alex is so shocked that it takes him a second to realise that the man’s close enough to strike if Alex wants to - flip the gun out of his hands, or simply hit a blow to his temple - 

“I wouldn’t, if I were you.”

For a split second, Alex thinks he must have spoken out loud. Then he realises his whole body is tense; he’s telegraphing his thoughts instead. Either way, he realises almost immediately that it was a spectacularly stupid idea: the gun is too close, the man’s finger coiled around the deadly catch that will release a bullet straight into Alex’s brain with the tiniest twitch. And so Alex is forced to stand stock still, face burning, as the stranger traces the ropes that stretch in a v-shape between his legs and end up in his right hand. He’s so close Alex can see the faint lines around his eyes; the smattering of silver in the hair near his temples. Older than Alex thought at first glance, but not old. Late thirties, Alex guesses. Still a threat.

“Satisfied?” It comes out hoarse; his mouth is dry. He’s not used to complete strangers getting so close. And he still hasn’t worked out whether this man is friend or foe: the gun is unnerving, but who checks the ropes of someone they’re about to shoot?

“Yes. Very good.” The stranger takes a step backwards, but he’s still in the space between the two lines of rope that extend to the tree. He nods at the length in Alex’s hand. “Ideally you would wear a glove.”

Alex knows that. He thought about wrapping a t-shirt or something around his hand instead to protect it, but he can’t risk the rope slipping; he needs a good grip. If he takes it slow, the damage should be minimal. Although the chances of him taking it slowly are diminishing by the second.

“The safety check’s appreciated and all,” he says, “but if you don’t let me go soon, it’s going to be pretty pointless.”

The man stares at him impassively. It occurs to Alex that maybe he’s not decided what he’s going to do next; that there is an equal chance this man will kill him, or let him go. 

He can hear shouts. The barking is louder still - out of his eye, Alex sees black shapes: the dogs. They are running towards them. It can’t be long before - 

“They’re coming,” he says.

The stranger turns his head just as the guards come into view. They are some distance away. It doesn’t stop the clatter of machine gun fire. It lands short but it’s a matter of seconds before it doesn’t. 

Alex inches backwards. Yes, there’s a chance the stranger is going to shoot him if he moves much - but if he’s going to be shot anyway he might as well take the gamble. 

The man’s eyes snap back to him. For a moment, their gazes meet, each fixed on the other, and the world seems to fade out to a buzz around them.

Then, in one swift motion, the man pockets his gun and moves forward. Alex realises what he’s about to do a second before it happens.

“No!” he says. “Don’t - ”

There’s no time to react. The man’s body collides forcefully with his, arms wrapping around Alex’s waist. The weight sends Alex backwards - and then they are tipping, falling over the edge of the cliff, locked in a deadly embrace.

* * *

_“That was a very big risk to take.”_

_Alex is started out of his reverie at the words. He has been speaking without a break, and he’s almost forgotten where he is. Opposite him, the case officer charged with debriefing him has paused in her note taking, face solemn. She isn’t a stranger; she’s acted as his handler loads of times. She is the calm, unflappable sort, but Alex has never warmed to her. Maybe because she always insists on passing uninvited commentary._

_“Well, I didn’t take it,” he says, bristling at the implied criticism. “It wasn’t like I had much choice in the matter. He literally threw us off the edge of a cliff.”_

_“No, you misunderstand,” she says. “It was a very big risk for him. To trust that you wouldn’t drop the rope.”_

_Alex understands what she means. The man had checked all the ropes around Alex, but tipping them both into the void, taking Alex completely by surprise - the man had put both of their lives into Alex’s hands._

_Alex didn’t think of that before. He was too busy making sure they didn’t die._

* * *

He can’t help it. He lets out a yell. It’s meaningless, of course - they are already falling through the air. The rope is slithering hopelessly through his grip and around his hand, pain slicing white hot across his palm and wrist. The air whistles past him. He imagines them free falling three hundred feet, the ground rushing up to meet them - 

\- and then his hand suddenly tightens around the rope, and they slam to a halt in mid-air - so suddenly his breath seems to have kept going, knocked out of his lungs. 

He has no idea how far they’ve gone. With the man’s body still pressed against his, the weight threatening to continue to push them down, Alex can’t turn and look without risking losing control of the whole situation. He thinks it’s quite far. There is a lot of rocky cliff above him. The ground might be quite close.

“Let go,” the man says.

For some reason, Alex does as he’s told.

The fall is short - less than a second and his back hits something hard - compacted sand. The man is on top of him, pinning him to the ground, but it’s momentary - a second later he is rolling off, to the side. Alex can only lie there. He thinks he might be in shock. Or dead, possibly.

“Get up,” the man says. “Drop the ropes.”

Through thoughts which feel sluggish, Alex cottons on. The rope is still around the tree at the top; if he stays wrapped in it, he could be hauled straight back up again. He unfurls the hand wrapped around the rope. The movement is startlingly painful, the creases of his palm unwilling to stretch, stinging as the rope moves across them. There’s no time to dwell on it. He sits up, wriggling out of the ropes and pushing himself to his feet. His legs are weak - shaky with the receding adrenaline.

“What the hell - ” he starts.

“Later,” the man bites out. Alex stares at him incredulously for a second, before realising he’s right. They can’t hang around. They need to get out of danger.

(He’s not exactly sure when _he_ became _they._ Maybe the moment the man’s body hit his.)

The man is already off, tracking close to the cliff - the safest place to be when you might be shot at from above. The rope is being tugged upwards as Alex follows after the man. 

“Where are we going?”

Although the man doesn’t slow down, there’s a quick turn of the head in his direction.

“I have transport,” he says. “At the end of the beach.”

Alex falters for a second, wondering whether he’s really going to get into this transport - whatever it is - with a stranger who just nearly killed him, before realising he doesn’t have many other options. He has a boat nearby, but it’s a slow and battered thing; made for fishing. The nearest island is nearly 100 kilometres away and the waves are starting to swell. He’s not sure he fancies his chances. 

Especially not with the state of his hand. As they hurry along, he risks a glance down at it. The burn from the rope is vicious - taking up most of the crease of his palm and patches of his fingers. It is red and raw and bleeding, dead, white skin pushed to the edges of the wounds, and it _hurts_. In the minute or so since he dropped the rope it’s already stiffened up; he can’t even flex it.

He can shoot with his left hand, but not well. If the man turns on him, he’s probably dead. 

On the other hand, he’s not in much of a fit state to defend himself from the onslaught of the guards he’s left at the top of the cliff either.

They reach the end of the beach. It is part jungle from here - and Alex isn’t really dressed for it, in shorts and a light jersey that’s already too hot in the Sri Lankan heat. Nor does he feel particularly good about following a stranger into a place where he is hidden from view. But they don’t walk far. About a hundred yards in, there is a small clearing, where a 4x4 sits, completely out of place. 

The man walks around the back of the car, and opens the boot.

“Get in,” he says. 

Alex moves towards the passenger side. His right arm hangs uselessly at his side. The pain jars every time he moves. It feels worse than a skin injury - the kind of deep, sharp pain usually associated with a broken bone. He wants to cradle it, to protect it, but he’s still not exactly sure that this man is someone he wants to betray weakness to.

“No,” the man says. “In here.” 

He means the boot. Alex stares. 

“You must be joking.”

The man’s face tells him that he is very much not joking. 

Alex moves to the back of the car. Looks dubiously inside the boot. It’s roomy enough - and in theory it won’t be as bad as if he were in the back of an ordinary car, because it’ll just be the parcel shelf above him - that he could punch out with his left hand if he really had to - but it’ll still be hot. And claustrophobic. 

“No.” He shakes his head. 

The man raises his eyebrows. For a moment Alex thinks he’s going to argue - but it’s worse than that. In one swift moment the man suddenly grabs him - around the shoulders and under his knees - and bundles him into the boot. Alex is too shocked even to cry out - and then the boot comes slamming down and he’s trapped in a stifling furnace.

A few seconds later he hears another door open - the man getting in. Alex’s wits are very much about him again by this time, and he thumps his good fist against the parcel shelf. 

“What the fuck?”

“Don’t swear,” comes the mild reply, slightly muffled by the seats and shelf around Alex. It’s an odd thing to say. The sort of reprimand a father might give his son. Alex feels a lot like telling the man where he can shove his reproaches, but - for once - his brain catches his mouth in time. Somehow - instinct, again - he knows that shouting further abuse will be met with cold silence. He takes a deep breath. Tries to sound reasonable.

“Just tell me where we’re going.” His voice comes out shaky - he already feels dehydrated, or maybe it’s the pain. 

“There’s no need to panic.” Calm. Assured. “We just need to get through the checkpoint. I’ll let you out on the motorway and you can contact your employer.”

It is the end of the conversation. He starts the car.

* * *

_"The motorway?”_

_Alex starts. He’s got lost in the story again. His throat feels dry and there’s a throbbing ache somewhere deep in his skull. He reaches out and takes a sip from the glass of water on the desk. His throat feels better but the headache doesn’t ease._

_“Sorry?”_

_“He said he’d let you out on the motorway,” the case officer says patiently. “What did he mean? There’s no motorway on Marangal.”_

_Alex frowns. She’s right, of course - the island is barely more than 20 kilometres long. The roads are full of potholes and vehicles have to pull in to pass. Definitely no motorways. Has he misremembered?_

_He closes his eyes. Tries to think back. The pounding in his head seems to get worse - and then he lands on the right answer, and it recedes, just slightly._

_“It wasn’t a car,” he says. “It was a seaplane.”_

_The case officer just looks at him. Alex wonders if she thinks he’s mad. He’s starting to wonder if he’s going mad too. Why did he think it was a car?_

_“It’s all right,” she says after a moment, and she sounds surprisingly nice - for her. “You’ve done a lot of debriefs, and you’ve had a stressful experience. A bit of confusion is normal.”_

_Yeah. Fair. Except Alex can’t remember having made up whole encounters before._

_He pauses, trying to shake some of the apprehension that is pooling in his stomach - worry that something is wrong with him. Had he hit the beach harder than he’d thought? Maybe after this he ought to ask to be checked out properly by a doctor._

_He takes a steadying breath. Goes back. Picks up where he went wrong._

* * *

They reach the end of the beach. It is part jungle ahead, and the man ploughs through it. Alex follows. But they don’t go far; they are at the edge of the island, and he can tell they are moving towards its perimeter, not inland. It’s only five minutes or so before they burst into open air again and he is greeted with a floating jetty next to a small seaplane. 

“How did you - ”

“Move,” says the man shortly. “We don’t have long.”

He moves across the unstable, wobbling jetty as if he’s floating - quick, sure strides Alex can’t hope to emulate. His hand is hurting worse than ever, but he ignores it. He’s trying to make sense of this. If it were that easy to just have a seaplane on the island, he’d have had one himself - it would have made for a much better escape plan. But the facility controls the whole island - even a tiny boat had been a big risk. 

The only logical conclusion is that the man didn’t care if he was seen. And if he didn’t care if he was seen, he must have had business with the people running the facility. And if he had business with the people running the facility - 

He’s new to the team, Alex realises. That’s why he didn’t recognise him immediately. But last night a small team of people had arrived. Ostensibly for security purposes. It was one of the reasons Alex decided it was time to get out.

“You’re one of them,” he says, stopping. It’s a mistake. The jetty is lurching in the waves and he nearly loses his balance. 

The man barely pauses. “In,” he says, and climbs into the plane.

Alex hesitates for a moment, and then follows. What other choice does he have? 

When he climbs into the passenger seat, the man is fiddling with the plane controls. Likely _his_ plane, then - which makes it more and more likely he’s enemy rather than ally. Alex isn’t quite sure, if that’s the case, why this man seems to be helping him escape, but he’s had stranger experiences. If the man flew him to the next island only to put him in a tank with a hammerhead shark....well, it wouldn’t be the first time that had happened to him. Should Alex get out again? Is he better off taking his chances on the island, or letting this stranger fly him to Christ-knows-where?

“No, I’m not one of _them,_ as you say,” the man says. He pulls on his seatbelt and a pair of headphones; he passes the same to Alex. It strikes Alex that people who are about to throw you into a shark tank do not bother protecting your hearing first.

He puts them on.

“Seatbelt,” the man says, and turns the key in the ignition.

* * *

They fly for only twenty minutes or so, by Alex’s watch. It’s a decent watch, given to him by the MI6 tech department on his eighteenth birthday. It’d have been nice if it had been a birthday present, but in fact it was just as they were about to drop him into the middle of the Congo. It looks a lot like any flashy smartwatch, but it’s virtually indestructible. It also contains a tracking beacon, activated by pressing the side button three times. 

As they land, he wonders why he hasn’t done that yet. His phone tells him that they have landed on an island to the west of _Marangal_ called _Thamarai_ \- which from memory Alex thinks means lotus flower. That means his backup (they’ve actually given him backup this time, or at least they say they have) is only half an hour away, on the next island. They could be here within half an hour. Forty minutes, tops. They’d bundle him away from whoever this stranger is and he’d be safe.

But he’s still a bit uncertain whether he’s in any real danger. Since the man pocketed the gun and knocked them both off the side of a cliff, he’s not actually threatened Alex in any way. For whatever reason, he seems to have made up his mind they’re allies - or, at least not enemies. Midway through the flight, he even pointed Alex to a first aid kit at his feet, and Alex spent the next ten minutes clumsily slathering on aloe gel and a bandage.

His hand is completely useless. Even when he’s finished, it feels hot and swollen in his lap. Probably, it needs proper medical attention. He’s not exactly sure where he’s going to get that.

“What now?” he asks, when the plane has come to a halt on the water, next to another jetty. He unbuckles himself with his left hand. The man glances at him but says nothing. Instead, he pulls off the headset and then, with an ease of grace suggestive of a cat, hauls himself out of the pilot’s seat and climbs out.

Alex isn’t sure what to do other than follow.

The jetty’s larger; more stable than the last one. Official, not makeshift - there are other boats and another seaplane sitting along it. When they reach the shore they are almost immediately accosted by a local - the port supervisor - and words are exchanged in French. They have a licence to leave the plane here. Or, at least, they do once a wad of notes is placed on top of the supervisor’s clipboard.

She wanders off, suitably satisfied, and the man turns to Alex. Once again Alex finds himself being assessed by an arresting blue gaze. 

“So - I guess I should go,” he says uncomfortably. “Er - thanks for the lift?” _And throwing us off a three hundred foot drop,_ he doesn’t add. 

The man’s face is impassive. There is another second before his gaze drops, his chin jerking a little to indicate interest.

“How’s your hand?”

Alex takes it away from where he has been holding it to his chest to reduce the swelling and shows him, palm upwards. His rudimentary first aid hasn’t done a lot for its appearance; the gauze is already sickeningly soggy with cream and blood, and it hangs limply around the middle of Alex’s hand. It has already unravelled from his wrist, revealing the weeping red mark.

“You need a hospital,” the man observes.

“I’ll just pop off to one, then, shall I?” Alex asks. It is sarcastic. There are no hospitals on this group of islands; the nearest one is on mainland Sri Lanka. And he’s not getting there in a hurry; not if he’s got to sit here and wait for MI6 to turn up first. His tone, heavy with irony, earns him another flicker of a glance.

“It’s a serious burn. You should know better than to leave it untreated.”

“Yeah, I know,” Alex sighs, and then stops, surprised by how naturally that slipped out. The man is frowning too; for the first time, he looks actively unsettled. There is a lengthy pause before he speaks.

“I am in a hotel close by. Come.”

It’s not a suggestion, and it should feel threatening, but it doesn’t. Nor does there seem to be any doubt in the man’s mind that Alex will, indeed, come: he has already turned and walked off, expecting Alex to follow. 

Bizarrely, Alex does.

The hotel they go to is fairly upmarket, but average for this part of the world - sparkling tiles on the floor and white everywhere to keep things cool. Alex feels hot and dirty as they make their way across the lobby. No one seems to raise an eyebrow - perhaps because the man Alex is following keeps walking as if it would be a mistake to challenge him. 

They get into the lift, and the man presses the button for the ninth floor. They are going to his room. Alex should probably feel alarmed about that. Hotel rooms, admittedly, aren’t very good places to kill people; the evidence hard to hide when cleaners will descend the minute it’s vacated. But unease has flickered on and off since this man happened upon him, and it’s back now, crawling in Alex’s chest as he wonders why on earth he’s just trapped himself, injured, in an enclosed space with a man whose motives he can’t begin to guess. And who seems to have known a bit too much about Alex from the start; treated him with a measure of familiarity that feels disturbingly natural but is entirely unwarranted.

“If you’re not with the facility,” Alex says, because he’s beginning to think maybe he’s been a bit too passive in all this, “who are you?”

The man’s face is blank. “I was hired to investigate the possibility of a security problem,” he says. Tone casual. 

“Oh,” is all Alex can say. Heart jittery. After all, he _was_ the security problem. 

The man catches his expression in the reflection of the copper-coloured walls. He shrugs. “They paid up front.” 

“What, so you took their money and ran?” No honour amongst thieves, Alex guesses, but even he thinks that’s a bit cold. “Why?”

The man doesn’t answer. They have stopped moving; the doors open. He steps out and, beckoning Alex over his shoulder with one hand, moves along the hallway. Once again certain Alex will follow. 

Once again, he does. He can’t account for it. It’s profoundly unsettling, how much he seems instinctively to trust this man. A man who has just confessed to shafting his own side, too. 

Is he making a mistake? He’s about to find out.

The room has a Do Not Disturb sign on it. There is a brief pause whilst the man retrieves a spray from his pocket and uses it on the door handle. Diazafluoren. Used to find fingerprints. Alex uses it when he stays in hotels, too; Ben Daniels has ribbed him for paranoia more than once, and Alex can never quite explain why he does it. It’s oddly reassuring to see someone else as suspicious as he is.

The room is as Alex might have imagined from the rest of the hotel: white, tiled, clean. The man walks to the desk, where a laptop and a mug are sitting; he seems to examine the distances between them before he turns back to Alex. 

“How long until MI6 arrive?”

Alex starts. The man gives him a thin-lipped smile. 

“You have a British accent and are wearing a watch manufactured by the Secret Intelligence Service. Believe me, it was not a difficult leap.” Cool gaze. “How long?”

“I haven’t called them.”

A frown. “Why not?”

And that’s the question, isn’t it? Alex doesn’t have an answer to it. 

“Call them,” the man advises, and disappears into the bathroom.

Still Alex doesn’t move. Instead, he looks around the room. There are personal belongings in evidence - the laptop for one, and there is a wash bag sitting on the bedside table, together with a book that looks like it might be in Japanese - but what strikes him is the _impersonality_ of the room. The belongings in it could belong to anyone. They tell him nothing about the man he’s just voluntarily followed across a sea and back to a hotel.

There is the sound of running water; the man has turned a tap on in the bathroom. He suddenly appears in the doorway and Alex blinks at him.

“In here.”

Alex obeys. He’s got a pretty good idea of what the man has in mind - and, sure enough, when Alex enters the small bathroom, the man immediately grabs him by the elbow. It is a work of a second for him to pull the gauze off Alex’s hand - Alex has never been the greatest at first aid - and then Alex’s hand and wrist are thrust into the sink, under the cool, gushing water of the tap. He notes the first aid kit sitting nearby; the man is rifling through it, picking out more gauze, and Savlon - _right,_ antiseptic cream; that’s what Alex was supposed to use.

“Hasn’t anyone taught you how to treat a rope burn?” the man asks.

Alex shrugs. There’s a lot of things MI6 haven’t bothered teaching him or training him for. 

“You should stay under that for fifteen minutes,” he’s told, and then the man disappears, leaving Alex standing, foolishly, by himself.

It’s not long before his fingers grow numb with cold. He alternates between holding his wrist and his palm underneath the running water. He can tell the sting is leaving - or maybe it’s just he can’t feel anything anymore - and the wound is looking cleaner, the fibres from the rope washed away. He holds it under until he can’t bear it anymore - he’s got no idea if it’s fifteen minutes or five - and then knocks the tap off. He’s just wondering what he’s supposed to do next when the man returns. 

“In the bedroom,” he says, and picks up the first aid kit.

When Alex leaves the bathroom he discovers that even the few belongings that were scattered about the room have disappeared; packed into a leather holdall, he guesses, that has appeared from nowhere and now sits on the floor next to the door. The man is going somewhere. But first Alex is guided to a seated position on the bed. The first aid kit is placed next to him, and the man pulls up the chair from the desk to sit so that they are face to face.

He works for at least a minute in silence. Hands quick and sure pat Alex’s hand dry with a paper towel before taking up the antiseptic cream. After the cold of the water, it barely feels cool and he only watches, strangely detached, as the man carefully smoothes it on with fingers Alex didn’t really imagine being so gentle. He finds his gaze flickering up again to the man’s face - at the chiselled line of the man’s jaw and long blond eyelashes that are lowered as he concentrates on what he is doing.

Something stirs in Alex’s stomach. None of this makes any _sense._

“Why didn’t you kill me?” The question slips out before he’s even really thought about it.

The man’s eyes flicker up to his and then down again. There is a momentary pause. Then: “I do not kill children.”

“I’m not a child,” Alex has to point out. He resists the urge to add that even when he was, it never seemed to deter anyone’s murderous tendencies towards him.

The man’s hands still for a fleeting moment. A frown. “No,” comes the answer, and when the man looks up this time, he looks unsettled again. “You’re not, are you?” He says it with the air of someone who expected the opposite. Alex watches him, perturbed. Eventually the man shrugs, and picks up the gauze. “You remind me of someone.”

“Who?”

“I’m not sure.” 

It might be a lie. It’s hard to tell. Alex swallows. He’s not going to say what he’s thinking, which is that this man sort of reminds him of someone too. But perhaps he just has one of those faces. Some people do. In this sort of line of work, it’s a useful trait: reassuringly familiar; instantly forgettable.

Only Alex isn’t sure he’s going to forget this experience in a hurry. Everything feels a bit surreal. He keeps expecting something to happen - the ground to be metaphorically whipped out from under his feet: a gun drawn on him again, or perhaps those long, strong fingers suddenly around his throat. It’s almost more remarkable that all the man does is tend to Alex’s injuries. He wraps the gauze with practised, efficient ease, looping the bandage around Alex’s palm, between his thumb and index finger, and around his wrist. When he is finished, he rips the end off and fastens it securely. His head tips to one side, admiring his work.

“Thanks,” Alex says. His mouth feels dry; he swallows.

“You may not even need a hospital.” The man gets up. The first aid kit is closed up; it is put in the holdall. Then he returns to Alex. He reaches out, and for a moment Alex thinks he’s going to take his injured hand again, but it’s the other wrist he seizes. Before Alex can register what he’s doing, he has pressed the button on the side three times.

How does he know how it works? “What did you do that for?”

“You need retrieving, don’t you?”

“Yes, but - ” Alex doesn’t know what to say. Yes, he needs retrieving. But he’s used to being left to his own devices; he can’t quite voice how strange it feels, to have someone insist on taking care of him in this way.

“Well, then.” The man straightens up. “This is my cue to leave.” He turns. Alex has the overwhelming sense they might never see each other again. The knowledge causes him a panic that is completely, absurdly irrational.

“Wait! Don’t go.”

The man stops next to his holdall. Turns again with it in his hand. His face is blank.

“Why not?”

“I - we could - ” Alex feels the back of his neck heating up as he realises it sounds like he’s trying to proposition this stranger. What’s on the verge of coming out of his mouth, however, is infinitely more bizarre: not a suggestion that they stay, but that they _both_ leave. Together. Leave the world behind and disappear somewhere safe. He doesn’t know what that means. It’s just a sense - without any reason for it - that there’s somewhere safer for both of them. 

It sounds mad even in Alex’s head. He can’t possibly say it out loud.

The man tilts his head again, studying him. 

“Alex Rider,” he says after several long seconds, and a strange expression crosses his face. “I think we will see one another again, somehow.”

And then he’s gone, and Alex is left sitting on the bed alone.

* * *

_“He never told you his name?”_

_Alex inhales deeply. He feels strangely lightheaded having got to the end of his account. He thinks maybe he said a bit more than he really meant to. “No.”_

_There is a long pause. The case officer’s mouth has tightened into a narrow line. She looks unhappy. Alex wonders if his risk taking has, for once, gone a bit too far. Following a stranger into his hotel room is far down the list of most stupid things he’s done in his life, but this time it wasn’t in the name of saving anyone. It had been his own impulse - a naïve curiosity and trust that could have been badly misplaced._

_“Did he look familiar?” the case officer asks at last._

_She is trying to give him an out, Alex suspects; something to make the report a bit more palatable. It’s a bit late for that, though. He’s already given a description; has made it clear enough the man was, so far as he was concerned, a stranger to him._

_“No,” he says again. He looks down at his bandaged hand. Even though it’s been two days and eight and a half thousand kilometers, the dressing still feels reassuringly secure. He ought to have it changed anyway, really. He doesn’t know why he’s been putting it off._

_“He_ felt _familiar,” he finds himself saying. He knows he’s already sort of alluded to that, but he feels the urge to state it plainly, to have someone rationalise for him, because he’s tried for forty-eight hours and drawn a blank. “It was like - from the moment I saw him. There was something about him. It felt like I knew him.”_

_There is a sigh. Another lengthy pause. Then:_

_“You did.”_

_It takes Alex a second to process this. “What?”_

_The case officer looks weary. The pen that she has been writing with is reunited with its lid and placed on the table next to the notepad. “You knew him once,” she says. “And I think you still do, if you really search your mind for it.”_

_The cryptic hints aren’t any help. Alex doesn’t have the patience for it. Not after two days of turning the strange encounter over and over in his head._

_“Who is he?”_

_“You know who he is.”_

_“I don’t even know his name.”_

_“You told me his name at the start of this conversation.” She flips to the start of her notes and reads aloud. “‘My first impressions of Yassen Gregorovich weren’t promising.’” She flips back again and sets the notebook down on the table and fixes Alex with a polite, expectant stare._

_Alex sits, frozen, to his seat._

_Yassen Gregorovich. The name seems so obvious somehow: immediately fitting in a way that it shouldn’t be. But Alex is equally, utterly certain that the man never said his name aloud._

_It’s as if he’s been drenched in a bucket of cold water. How did he know it?_

_His breath hitches; he tries to concentrate; think back as to whether he missed any detail. Their conversation on the clifftop. Their time in the plane. The hotel. His mind jumps instead to somewhere else. There they are, the two of them, standing face to face. Every detail of the memory is fuzzy, blurred out, except for the man, whose face is in razor-sharp focus. He’s younger, somehow - less tired; perhaps under less strain._

_“Killing is for grown-ups and you’re still a child.”_

_Yassen._

_He flinches backwards in shock. There is a pain in his head - like a sharp pinprick in the middle of his skull. But it’s spreading, and with it it’s as though a floodgate has opened, and Alex’s head is filled with images. A cool, calm expression as a yacht sweeps into the South of France. On board a plane in London; an invitation for Alex to find his destiny in the face of death. Their next meeting, in the middle of the Bolivian rainforest; a dead man alive, a broken wrist and a 4x4. More countries, more meetings - and it’s as though something fierce Alex didn’t even know was dormant has come alive inside of him._

_How could he have forgotten about_ Yassen?

_“I - ” He can’t speak; his throat is tight._

_“You remember him.” The case handler doesn’t sound surprised, but she does sound disappointed. She lets out a sigh. “Alex, why do you keep doing this?”_

_“Doing what?” The question comes out hoarse; disbelieving._

_Short fingernails tap on the table. They sound strangely far away. “This procedure was supposed to keep you both on opposite sides.” Pursed lips. “But you keep finding ways around it, don’t you?”_

_And with another burst of pain that threatens to split his head open, Alex realises they’ve been here before - not this room, but this conversation: Alex_ remembering _, and then -_

_“You did this,” he whispers. “You made me forget.”_

_“Yes.” She is unapologetic._

_“Why? He’s - ”_

_But there are no words to describe what Yassen is. He is distant and cold and a_ killer _, Alex remembers. He is also, in a way that defies explanation even with the memories pouring into his brain, the person Alex trusts most in the world._

_That was why they had done it._

_Alex remembers now, the first time - being wrestled into a chair with straps; the equipment and electrodes - and the terrifying knowledge that this had been done to Yassen too -_

_“It’s for your own good, Alex,” the case officer says softly. “Gregorovich will kill you. Scorpia will make sure of it.”_

_“But he remembers me!” The words burst out of Alex’s mouth, terrified. He can’t forget. Not again. “Even if they keep wiping his memory, he’s not going to kill me - ”_

_“Dr Three’s methods keep being refined, Alex. You know we can’t take that risk.”_

_With a sickening dread, Alex knows what risk they mean. It is the risk that, even faced with Yassen’s gun, the Alex who knows Yassen Gregorovich won’t move to defend himself. It’s the risk that he’ll stand there and let his own murder happen, because he can’t kill Yassen. He won’t._

_The knowledge that this is being done just so that he’ll have the guts to shoot first is too much. Bile rises up his throat, hot and vicious -_

_“But he keeps remembering,” he chokes out. Willing her to understand._

_The case officer’s face is pitying. “Last time he remembered your name.”_

_Another throb in the depths of his skull. Alex remembers she’s right: in Mexico that time, the name dropping out of Yassen’s mouth and surprising them both. And the time before that - in Paris - Yassen had remembered_ him _, even if not their history: “We know one another” said in time with the lowering of his gun._

_More and more slipping away every time. How long before they meet and Yassen shoots before he asks questions?_

_Alex knows why his subconscious wanted them to run. If only he’d had the guts to say it._

_Behind him, the door opens. At once he is on his feet._

_“No!” he says. “You can’t - ”_

_But they are ready for him. He lashes out, and, as if they’ve done this before, someone catches his wrist; twists it. It’s his injured wrist, the one Yassen bound up for him, and he lets out a noise of pain as he is forced down onto his knees. He is still struggling; he won’t go quietly; and maybe they’ve learned their lesson by now, because a second later there’s a sharp jab of a needle in his neck - and Alex knows it’s over._

_It takes several minutes for the sedative to kick in. He can feel the hard floor under his knees; his breath coming out in ragged breaths as he tries to focus. Even as the blackness creeps at the edge of his vision, he inhales deeply, willing himself, desperately, to remember...to keep on remembering..._

* * *

Another time; another country; and it’s hard to know whether to look at the ice cold blue of Yassen Gregorovich’s eyes or the muzzle of the gun pointing between Alex’s own.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Febuwhump Day 24 - "Memory Loss".
> 
> [doppelgranger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/doppelgranger/pseuds/doppelgranger) has done the most beautiful art for this fic, which can be found [here](https://www.instagram.com/p/CL-D1Q8Jtkl/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link). Do check out the rest of their art on their [Instagram page!](https://www.instagram.com/yucasava/)


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